“The Sahara Desert was once a lush, green landscape with rivers and abundant wildlife.”

From about 9500 to 4500 years ago, lower Wadi Howar flowed through an environment characterized by numerous ground water outlets and freshwater lakes.

Stone artifacts, fossils, and rock art, widely scattered through regions now far too dry for occupation, reveal the former human presence, together with that of game animals, including antelopes, buffalo, giraffe, elephant, rhinoceros, and warthog. Bone harpoons, accumulations of shells, and the remains of fish, crocodiles, and hippopotamuses are associated with prehistoric settlements along the shores of ancient Saharan lakes.

The climate of the Sahara has undergone enormous variations between wet and dry over the last few hundred thousand years, believed to be caused by long-term changes in the North African climate cycle that alters the path of the North African Monsoon. Some scientists estimate that the Sahara became arid about two to three million years ago, while others contend that it happened before this.

There is widespread evidence that the Sahara was periodically vegetated in the past, with the proliferation of rivers, lakes and water-dependent animals such as hippos, before it became what is now desert. These North African Humid Periods may have been crucial in providing vegetated corridors out of Africa, allowing the dispersal of various species, including early humans, around the world.

Analysis of stalagmite samples from caves in southern Morocco has provided new insights into rainfall patterns in the Sahara Desert in the past. Researchers from the University of Oxford and the Institut National des Sciences de l'Archéologie et du Patrimoine have discovered that rainfall in the desert increased between 8,700 and 4,300 years ago, which had a major impact on ancient herding societies.

There is widespread evidence that the Sahara was periodically vegetated in the past, with the proliferation of rivers, lakes and water-dependent animals such as hippos, before it became what is now desert. These North African Humid Periods may have been crucial in providing vegetated corridors out of Africa, allowing the dispersal of various species, including early humans, around the world.

In the not-so-distant past, the Sahara hosted networks of rivers and mega-lakes, while supporting widespread vegetation. For this reason, these periods of the Sahara's history have been termed the 'Green Sahara'. The episodes of Sahara greening are thought to have been spurred by changes in Earth's orbital forcing, which are measures of our tilt towards the sun and our orbital path around it.

Paleoclimate research shows that during periods known as African Humid Periods, roughly between 11,000 and 5,000 years ago, the Sahara supported lakes, rivers, grasslands, and even human settlements. These wetter intervals were driven by changes in Earth's orbital configuration that strengthened the African monsoon.

Rainfall patterns in the Sahara during the six-thousand-year “Green Sahara” period have been revealed by analyzing marine sediments, according to new research. What is now the Sahara Desert was the home to hunter-gathers who made their living off the animals and plants that lived in the region's savannahs and wooded grasslands 5,000 to 11,000 years ago.

Large parts of the Sahara Desert were green thousands of years ago, evidenced by prehistoric engravings in the desert of giraffes, crocodiles and a stone-age. The fertile periods generally lasted five thousand years and humidity spread over North Africa up to the Mediterranean coast.

The growth of the Sahara, particularly toward the south, has been influenced by the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation, a natural climate cycle that changes the Atlantic Ocean from warm to cold phases every 60 to 80 years and can impact rainfall patterns across much of Africa.

Simulating paleoclimates in the Sahara region, a team of researchers from Germany and United Kingdom has found evidence of three major river systems that likely existed in North Africa about 130,000 – 100,000 years ago, but are now largely buried by dune systems in the desert. When flowing, these rivers – Irharhar, Sahabi and Kufrah – likely provided fertile habitats for animals and vegetation, creating 'green corridors' across the region.

It has been lush-green, damp and full of rivers in the past (about 230 times in the last 8 million years, every 21,000 years or so, to be more precise).

The Sahara before 4000 BC: Lake Mega-Chad was just one of several massive paleo-lakes in Africa, such as Lake Fezzan, Lake Turkana, and Lake Chotts. A vast system of wadis, particularly in what is now Libya, irrigated the land. All that was to change over a period of about one thousand years after the monsoon belt, also called the tropical rain belt, started to slip south around 4000 BC.

During the African Humid Period (roughly 14,800 to 5,500 years ago), the Sahara experienced significantly higher rainfall due to shifts in the Intertropical Convergence Zone, supporting savannas, lakes, and river systems with evidence from sediment cores, pollen records, and rock art depicting wildlife like giraffes and crocodiles.

Scientists from the University of Arizona recently announced that what is now the Sahara desert was once wet and green and extended as far north as the Mediterranean Sea. The scientists estimated that past Saharan rainfall was ten times greater than today's between 5,000 and 11,000 years ago. Biblical creationists don't accept these age estimates, which are higher than allowed by the Bible's short chronology and are based on doubtful uniformitarian assumptions.